I was chatting with a prospect who stated he would do some RRSP in the last meeting and then changed his mind after the paperwork was submitted. He said he made the decision too fast and decided not to put the money in. Welll, the transaction didn't go through, of course.

So we chatted on the phone and he said he flavors TFSA more than RRSP. I have no specific preference on either, to me, it comes down to what works best and it is only an "account type". Most of the time (between TFSA and RRSP), you have very similar investment choices under the two.

By now, you should have already received your T4/T4As, T3s and T5s, majority of us would have gotten your RRSP receipts for your 2015 RRSP contributions. Some of you, however, might still be waiting on their first 60 days RRSP contribution receipts. If that’s the case, this is the time you can start calling the financial institutions for them.

In most cases, all companies have till the end of February to issue any T4s/T4As to our employees or associates. Bear in mind, if you miss the deadline, CRA will penalize you, not to mention you might screw up your employees or associates’ tax filing.

While the new year just rolled around, most of us would have thought of a "new year resolution". Regardless what is your resolution, improve your finances should be a part of it. Improve - there is always room for improvement :)

No matter where you are financially, you should start/continue to save in TFSAs, since our Liberal government had rolled back our 2016 TFSA contribution room, if you were 19 in 2009 (and had done absolutely nothing on it), you would have accumulated $46,500 TFSA contribution room by now.

Yes, I am doing this yearender at the last 2 weeks once again... I always thought we had gone through them before, we don't have to do this again, I am just so wrong on this...

Direct deposit request

We have talked about this last year but this is even more important this year as the CRA (as well as a whole list of Canadian governmental bodies) is going to stop sending cheques to us to cut cost from April 2016. Since it takes time for them to get things changed, do make the request to CRA before the tax season kicks in. If you don't, I am afraid, you won't get your tax refund anymore!

As a financial advisor, I always have discussion with clients and prospect on cashflow management, tax strategies and saving strategies. Whereas tax strategies seems to be one of the most brought-up issue (knowing that we pay high tax in Canada, this probably not surprising).

The Canadian taxation system is a gradual system, the more income you earn, the more tax you pay. If you are not sure how much tax you should pay, CRA has listed what percentage how much income should be taxed. If you want to know the exact amount you need to pay based on your income, Ernst & Young has an online

We have still about 2 weeks to go before 2014 leave us for good. Other than what I had written last year, I am adding a couple of moves this year :)

Make RSP withdraws

We talked about RSP meltdowns from time to time. If that's something you are considering and should your (projection) income in 2014 is lower (relatively) than your previous years, you might want to consider withdrawing a portion of your RSP before the year ends.

I was actually trying to avoid this topic for the longest time, since there are already so many of them out there, I thought my readers would have more than enough information needed regarding what they need to do by the year-end to make sure they get what they need for the 2013 calendar year...

Turns out, still lots of people seems not too sure what is needed and why they need to take these deadlines seriously.

Since the federal government pushed out "RRSP" in 1957, due to the fact that we get tax deduction from contributions we make, the banks and majority of financial advisors had been telling their clients to contribute into RRSP. RRSP, as the name suggested, was to promote savings for retirement by employees and self-employed people, because the federal government knew already back then, the CPP system will not be able to support all the retirees down the road. So, they came up with "tax deduction" as an incentive, to attract people to "save for retirement".